JUDGE: ‘CWEN’ has kindly provided a witness statement, in which you explain that you are ‘eco-feminists’?

TARA: Correct. Each banner is an artistic, feminist, environmental statement. The green one stands for CLIMATE WILL EVISCERATE NAYSAYERS. The red one—

JUDGE: Thank you. You discovered something, that later became national news, about a tip-off Sebastian Vane gave his brother, a property developer.

TARA: Yes, George Harcourt-Vane had lodged an application with the council which was prepared in the knowledge that the government was soon to change planning regulations for greenfield sites.

JUDGE: Who helped you?

TARA: We had a source.

JUDGE: The photographs you published—

TARA: Got syndicated all over the world. I myself took the one of the banner falling.

JUDGE: And the minister in the garden, kissing—

TARA: That’s completely different.

At the sight of the ninjas on the roof, Sebastian had shouted, ‘No!’ and ducked behind one of his mother’s outsize terracotta plant pots, with herbs in.

An instant later, when he learnt that the ninjas were just island schoolgirls, he knew that he had embarrassed himself. Cunting cunts! Luckily, the photographer and his assistant had missed it all. The woman Alice was still standing by the table where she’d been serving coffee, biting her lips, and texting somebody. The nun and Nina and the black Muslim woman had danced away across the lawn and were now in the field.

Alice looked round. She said, to Sebastian, ‘Yes, it’s definitely your daughter, Zoe, and her schoolfriends. They have an environment group at school.’

Up on the roof the ninjas had taken off their balaclavas and were taking selfies. She was right, unfortunately. One of them was Zoe.

‘I won’t call the police, then,’ he said.

He felt even angrier with his mother than before; really, it was hard to see the funny side, especially as he knew everyone was laughing at him. Fuck, these islands were annoying! Total chaos. Like the Third World on the edge of Britain.

‘Is that one with short hair a boy or a girl?’

‘A girl. Tara Gill,’ said Alice.

Seb turned to her.

‘You look familiar, do we know each other, actually?’ (Which, it turned out later, was one of his lines.) But Alice, looking up from her phone, already knew the answer. ‘You were two years ahead of me at college,’ she said; and he looked as amused as he was gratified. He asked a few questions, with genuine interest behind them, ‘Did our paths ever cross? Were you in any of the societies?’ And Alice, putting the phone back in her pocket, said, ‘No, not really, but I remember you from—’

He took her arm. ‘Listen, while I’m waiting for the photographers to set up the inside shots, let me show you round the garden. Have you been into the Victorian tower? My great-great-grandfather built it as a kind of folly. From the top floor you can see all the way across the islands—’